The present invention relates to apparatus intended for cutting substantially flat ceramic pieces such as plates, tiles and the like.
Apparatus directed to cutting flat ceramic pieces, which are well known, have been constituted by a substantially flat frame for supporting the piece to be cut, with rising supports located at the ends thereof and carrying two fixed parallel bars which serve as a rail and a sliding guide for a hand lever-operated head carrying a tool for scoring the line where the cut is to be made. In some instances, the apparatus is provided with a device intended for performing the breaking of the scored or marked pieces.
In general, complication of the apparatus structure, in addition to tremendous increase in the cost of the apparatus itself, result from the arrangement of these additional devices for breaking or severing the pieces which have been marked with the score lines for cutting, especially when such cutting devices are to be operated by levers and annexed devices in addition to those members of which the apparatus is provided for cutting and scoring the ceramic pieces themselves.
However, if operation of the breaking or severing devices is attained by the same operating lever of the scoring tool carrier head, then the device intended for effecting the breaking or severing pressure must be situated forwardly of that scoring tool, thus making visual control of the scoring operation difficult. This constitutes a small but nevertheless significant nuisance in the use of such an apparatus, which, on the whole, has proven to be simple and efficient in all cases.